Heika's Take: The Stars earned their 5-2 victory against Philly

DALLAS --There were a lot of moving pieces in the Stars' 5-2 win over the Philadelphia Flyers on Saturday.
And they all seemed to fit into place.

Dallas took Blake Comeau, Joel Kiviranta and Thomas Harley out of the lineup and inserted Jacob Peterson, Riley Tufte and Andrej Sekera. They moved Jamie Benn from wing to mostly center. And they shifted coaching assignments, as assistant John Stevens (who normally coaches the defensemen) moved to the press box while fellow assistant Todd Nelson ran the blueliners from the bench.
Oh yeah, and Anton Khudobin stepped in for goalie Braden Holtby, who is nursing a minor lower-body injury.
As a result, the team got its first win in regulation, scored its highest goal total on the season, and was able to enjoy its first winning total of more than one goal. Dallas moves to 5-6-2 with the victory, and stems for a little while at least, the feeling that things might be unraveling.
"It feels good to win. It feels really good," said forward Joe Pavelski. "It was a game that challenged us again early. I got off to a bad start taking a couple of penalties and putting the guys in a tough spot, but the killers did a tremendous job. We get the lead and Dobby was awesome in the first [period]. It was good and it allowed us to get our game going a little bit better."

Khudobin was the key to a lot of what happened Saturday, and he wasn't scheduled to start. He was contacted at 7 p.m. the night before and alerted that he would get the start because of Holtby's nagging injury. Bowness said Holtby is day-to-day, so we'll see where this goes, but it sure does seem like Khudobin earned the start Tuesday at home against the Red Wings.
Khudobin stopped all 19 shots he saw in the first period and allowed the Stars to exit with a 1-0 lead after 20 minutes. That was huge, as the team has been mentally fragile at times, and was able to take a deep breath, make some adjustments, and do so while not feeling the pressure of being behind.
"We talked in the locker room after the first, `Let's go and play like we talk about,' and I think we played second and third period pretty well today," said forward Roope Hintz. "We had the puck in the O-zone the most we've had, and I think we just played pretty well those two periods."

After getting outshot 19-7 in the first, Dallas had a 24-14 advantage in shots on goal for the remainder of the game. The Flyers played in Carolina on Friday, so they had some physical challenges, but the Stars also took advantage of that - something they hadn't always done this season.
"We got a lot of good efforts on all four lines and the defense," said head coach Rick Bowness. "It was well-balanced tonight."
The Stars' first goal was a beautiful play where Luke Glendening made a deflection of a John Klingberg shot and potted his fourth goal of the season. It was a heady play by a veteran player, and it was a big goal from a depth line. Mix that with Khudobin's play, and the star players were given quite a boost.
They took advantage in the second period, as Hintz found himself on the doorstep and scored off assists from Denis Gurianov and Jason Robertson to give the Stars their first two-goal lead since the season opener. Then, after Philadelphia cut that lead to 2-1 on a play where Glendening knocked the puck into his own goal, Tyler Seguin deflected in a Peterson shot/pass just 26 seconds later to not only give the Stars some breathing room, but to make a statement, as well.
"Swagger. That's what we want," Bowness said. "If we score, we want to go back at them. If they score, we want to go back at them. We've done it before, but tonight, that's swagger that you have to play with and poise, and don't let what happened affect your next shift. You're not going to control every shift. They're going to score goals, it's how we react, and I love how we reacted tonight."

Dallas carried a 3-1 lead into the second intermission, and then expanded that on an early power play in the third period. Pavelski scored off a nice pass from Hintz to make it 4-1, and Dallas then survived another Philly goal and added a Radek Faksa empty-netter for the final tally.
It wasn't perfect, but it was a huge sigh of relief for a team that's searching for some answers.
Tufte was called up from the minors, played his first NHL game, but logged just 4:25 in time on ice. Bowness said that the early penalty problems sort of threw off the lines, and that he struggled to get Tufte back in with linemates Faksa and Glendening.
"I had no issues with Riley whatsoever, but because of the penalties and the timing of the penalties, and again, Luke and Radek were there on the penalty kill, so I just couldn't get that line into a regular rotation of the flow of the game," Bowness said.
Peterson logged 11:51 in his return to the NHL and made a pretty play on the Seguin goal. Sekera logged 13:35 after four healthy scratches and tallied the 200th assist of his NHL career.
In the end, the Stars had a 63-62 edge in shot attempts, a 34-26 advantage in faceoffs, and a 23-13 advantage in hits. There were a lot of things to like.

As for the coaching swap, Bowness said the team wanted to shake things up in a lot of areas.
"We did that before, we had (Derek Laxdal) up in the press box in Calgary," Bowness said. "We change lines up, sometimes we change the coaches up."
Bowness said the coaching staff discusses strategy before every game, so decisions are shared in a lot of ways. As it is with the players, everyone has to adjust and try to build on this win.
Asked what the key was to taking the next step, Pavelski said: "Don't get ahead of ourselves. Understand what wins in this league and wanting to go forecheck, wanting to go into some hard areas, wanting to sacrifice a little bit more, and certain parts of the game to set us up in other areas. It's one. We understand we can't get it all back in a week. We just have to keep going out there and focus on what we are doing day-by-day."
Next time, they'll likely try to do it with a lot fewer changes.
Don't miss your chance to see the Stars conclude their homestand next Tuesday when they take on the Detroit Red Wings at 7:30 p.m. Get your tickets now!
This story was not subject to the approval of the National Hockey League or Dallas Stars Hockey Club.
Mike Heikais a Senior Staff Writer for DallasStars.com and has covered the Stars since 1994. Follow him on Twitter @MikeHeika.